


Whyte

by Andie_ZIR



Series: Timelie Waye [1]
Category: Danny Phantom
Genre: Blood and Gore, Clockwork's Apprentice, Dissection, F/M, Second Generation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-10-28 15:51:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17790290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Andie_ZIR/pseuds/Andie_ZIR
Summary: Rylie never thought the consequences could be this severe.





	1. Prologue

Clockwork brought his apprentice's body back to the clocktower, setting up a room so he could check her injuries better.

The ghost was young but had been his apprentice for a good few years. She had seafoam green skin, some of it covered in flecks of green. There was a y-shaped incision on her chest, her core clearly visible. It was grey and pulsing weakly- not a good sign for her.

Her white hair was matted with her own ectoplasm, tangled in knots that he would probably just have to cut. There was no way to undo those. Her clothes- a white hospital gown- were covered in her ectoplasm as well. Those agents didn't care what happened to her.

Burn marks raced up and down her arms- something the girl would probably hide for years to come.

She was limp, aura flickering. He _had_ to save her. It was his job to protect her and he should have never let her into that altered timeline.

Humans could be so _monstrous_. Sure, Dan was still one of the worst creatures in the world, but some humans ranked right up below him and the old king, Pariah Dark, in terms of how evil they could be. How could _anyone_ dissect someone so innocent?

He shook his head. Much of the skin and muscle of her chest were missing- he would have to put something there to protect her core.

As he stitched up what he could, his mind wandered to the Observants. How _dare_ they keep this from him. This was his apprentice that _they_ had given him, and they had let her get _this_ close to death. He _knew_ they had seen some of it. How they had acted when he'd tried to see into the timeline.

They had told him everything was fine, that she would come back soon enough.

He should have never let her go. He couldn't have seen what was going to happen- the damn Wanderer's blocking his vision- but they would have held him back anyways, even if he had known. They would have held him back until the very last moment, so he could only save her in the nick of time.

Like with Daniel's friends and family during the Nasty Burger accident.

He made a digital clock appear out of thin air. This would protect her chest and core for the foreseeable future. The numbers on it glowed weakly. She would need ectoplasmic transfusions to ramp up her healing. She would have the burn scars for a few years, but the incisions for the rest of her life.

Everything was as it should be. That didn't mean he had to like it.


	2. Chapter 2

Rylie floated in the air, on her back. She was just so _bored_. She wanted to go home, but she was always told it 'wasn't the right time.'

When would the right time _be_? She missed her family!

With a sigh, she righted herself, playing with the staff in her hands that had helped her control her growing powers. Straightening her black and purple dress, she looked around her room. "Maybe I should go find him and ask again?" The girl paused. "No, he'd know if I was going to do that… But what about an alternate timeline? I mean, if he says I can't see them, there's gotta be a reason that I can find out in an alternate timeline… Right?" She paced in the air before making up her mind.

Making her way to the viewing room, she thought about how she could word this. The only thing- he wasn't there. Where else could he be?

Taking a deep breath, she realized where she was. She needed to focus, this was one of her harder powers to control.

She felt the temporal energy gather around her, swirling like a vortex. Within a nanosecond, she was gone. In a different room that could only be reached by temporal teleportation. She felt her mentor's presence before she heard him speak.

"You want to see why you shouldn't go see your father right now," he said, not even asking.

"I mean, there has to be a good reason. He's been looking for me forever, Clockwork," she stressed. " _Please_. Even it's just an alternate timeline- I accept any consequences. I just… I have to know."

Clockwork sighed, making one of his time portals. "I've already created it for you. You _do_ know that I cannot see what you do in here-"

"Because I'm technically a Wanderer, yeah. Like I said, I accept the consequences," she said, straightening herself. "Can I go now? I wanna see my mom and dad," the girl looked anxious and excited.

He nodded and she darted into the portal, coming out in Amity Park. Or, alternate Amity Park, as this was an alternate timeline. But everything was still the same and she grinned from ear to ear.

Before she could even start heading home, she saw one person she had been looking for- her dad. His jumpsuit had more white on it than she remembered, but she remembered that hair. Those eyes. It was him.

"DADDY!" She exclaimed without thinking, tackling him in a tight hug.

"Daddy- What, kid, I'm not your dad," Danny replied, pushing her away. "I only have two kids-"

"Three. You _had_ three. Charlie, Finlie, and Rylie," the girl interrupted. "I- … You don't recognize me, dad?" She looked at him sadly.

" _How do you know about her?_ " Danny growled, suddenly grabbing her by the front of her shirt, his eyes glowing an angry green.

Instead of speaking, her red eyes faded to her old, purple hue. They were still glowing, but the color was unmistakable. The girl frowned, phasing out of his grip.

The anger faded immediately. "R- Rylie?" He whispered, before gathering her in his arms, hugging her tightly. She felt a wetness on her shoulder- he was crying. "Oh my god, I was looking for you everywhere- I never stopped. How are you- Why couldn't I- … I'm sorry."

"Dad," she sighed, hugging him tighter. "I'm Clockwork's apprentice. I couldn't- Apparently there wasn't a right time to see you? Something about ruining the timeline."

"You're here now, though. So now must be the right time, right?" He asked, sounding hopeful. He pulled away to look at his ghostly daughter.

"I mean, yeah," she lied with a smile. "I wouldn't be here if it wasn't, daddy."

"We need to get you home, sweetie. You mom and your siblings need to see you- so does everyone else for that matter," he smiled, giving her a one-armed hug.

This didn't seem so bad to her.


	3. Detection

Rylie hid behind her father, holding onto him tightly.

"What if they don't accept me, daddy?" She asked. "I know mom will, but what about Charlie and Fin?"

"Don't worry, sweetie," he said softly, smoothing down her hair. "You're still you, they'll still accept you." He brought her into the family room, phasing through her grasp. "Hey Sam, someone's here to visit!" He called out.

Quickly, Rylie made herself look more human. She still had pointed ears, but her eyes faded to a mix of her old amethyst and her current blood red. Her skin became tan, like Danny's when he was in his ghost form.

Sam came walking into the room, holding onto a book of some sort. "What is it, Danny-" She gasped, dropping her book. Slowly, she walked towards Rylie. "... Rylie?" She asked, as if saying her daughter's name would make the girl vanish.

"... Hi, mom. I'm back," the girl rubbed the back of her neck sheepishly, blushing green with embarrassment. Before she knew it, she was attacked with a hug by her mother.

"My baby," her mother breathed. "You're back. How come we couldn't-"

"Clockwork. I'm his apprentice," Rylie said. Her mother let go, looking at her in shock. Rylie let go of her human-like form, letting herself look more ghostly again. "He said I couldn't come back for a while. But I'm here now!"

"We're just glad you're back," Danny said with a smile. "Do you have to go back soon?"

"No _p_ e!" She replied, popping the p. "Where are Charlie and Fin? I wanna surprise 'em!"

"Charlie is out playing with his friends at the part. Fin is…"

There was a crash from the basement. "SORRY!" Finlie's voice came up from the lab. "I'LL CLEAN IT UP!"

"Training?" She asked, getting a nod from her parents. Without another word, she phased into the basement, looking for her brother.

Getting up from a pile of boxes was her half-ghost brother, wearing what looked like Phantom's old jumpsuit with the addition of a white cape. His hair was white with strands of green mixed in and he had the same glowing green eyes as Phantom.

His ghost sense went off and he shivered, turning around. Then, he narrowed his eyes, spotting who he thought was in intruder. "What're you doing here, ghost-"

"Finnie, it's me, Ry," she said softly, looking at her brother. She floated closer, only to get blasted back.

"Liar! Rylie's dead!" Fin shouted, angered by the use of his sister's name.

"Dad wouldn't have brought me back if he didn't believe me," she tried to reason with him, frowning deeply.

"Or you could just be tricking him!" The boy shot back, about to shoot off a blast.

"Once, when we were five, we got a cat named Cassie!" She said quickly, getting him to stop for a moment. "You let her out one day and she ran off. I told mom and dad it was me."

"Only Rylie would know that. How do you- You're telling the truth," he realized, his hands dimming in their glow before stopping altogether.

"Yeah. I became a ghost and I-" she realized she couldn't tell him everything like she could tell her mom and dad, because they knew who Clockwork was. Fin didn't. "I got really lost. I just found my way out," she lied.

"So why do you look like that instead of like me and dad?" He asked, cocking his head to the side in confusion.

"... Core differences?" She replied. She didn't even know the answer to that. Maybe it was because she was a Wanderer? Or maybe because she was the Time Master's apprentice? She mentally shrugged.

"Cool," he said in awe. "Charlie should be home soon, we can all play ghosts and hunters when she gets back."

"Good idea," Rylie said with a grin. "Until then, wanna train?"

"Against you? _Yeah_!" He shot off an ectobeam at her, which caused her to make a shield in front of herself.

They continued to just dart around the lab, shooting at each other and laughing, until Fin shot off an ice beam instead.

Rylie jolted, not having expected that- she wasn't using what little future vision she had, that would be cheating- and immediately defaulted to teleporting out of the way, eyes wide.

Teleporting wasn't a power she should have had at that point, and even Fin seemed to notice it. But, her brother shrugged it off and grinned. "You can teleport? _Cool_! You gotta teach me!"

"I- I- I can't, Finlie. It was hard enough for me to learn on my own," she lied. She could full well teach him, but the power exerted from it… She hoped no ghost hunters saw it. Everyone would be in trouble if they did.

"Aww, okay sis," he said.

"I'm home!" The two heard from upstairs.

Charlie.

"C'mon down, Charlie, we're gonna play ghosts and hunters!"

" _We_?" Their sister asked, opening the door leading downstairs.

"Yeah! Rylie's here!" Fin shot back.

Life was good.


	4. Capture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW for a *lot* of abuse. Feel free to skip this chapter if you don't think you can handle it.

The girl zoomed past another building, narrowly dodging a blast from an ectoweapon.

"Nononono, where's dad?" She asked herself, weaving through the air. A blast hit her back and she went tumbling through the air before falling to the ground. She went skidding, hitting her head against a tree.

Everything was spinning as people wearing white surrounded the girl. They all had guns pointed at her. What had she done?

"St- Stop," she moaned, trying to push herself up, only to get shot back down.

"Stay down!" One of them yelled at her. "You're under arrest, _ghost_."

"I- I didn't do a- anything-" She tried to plead, but it fell on deaf ears. Being grabbed by the shirt, she was pulled up and cuffed.

"Quiet, _ghost_ ," another agent said. An anti-ghost taser was shoved into her back and she screamed, passing out.

* * *

Rylie slowly became aware of her surroundings- or lack thereof. Everything was _white_. It was jarring and a total 180 from what she had been inside before.

She hopes, maybe, she's just in the lab at home, but her hopes are dashed and her fear spikes when she hears a harsh voice say, "Specimen 202-3. Get up."

She had been caught by the Guys in White.

"Nononononono," she said, grabbing her head. "I can't be here! Pum whaxavo te fo whemo, zis whaxas te fo pit wroaxam!" ( _I have to be home, this has to be a dream!_ )

A swift kick to where her ribs _used_ to be and a sharp pain raced through her chest. "I said _get up_ ," the human repeated.

"O- Okay, okay!" She exclaimed loudly, pushing herself up and forming legs. She was quickly grabbed by the arm.

"You're powerful, _ghost_. We detected your power from outside the state," he said, handcuffing the young ghost. "So now you get to be the new weapons tester."

She shook her head quickly. "N- No! I- I can't, please no-"

With a strike to the head, she was silenced. "You don't _get_ to choose. You're a _ghost_. You don't _have_ any rights," he snarled, dragging her to another room. He threw her in, slamming the door shut.

All around her were white walls and _dangerous_ looking weapons. There was a panel of glass separating three mean-looking agents from her room.

Rylie shook in her boots, looking around the room. She was terrified, and she _needed_ to find a way out of here!

Suddenly, a gun went off and she was hit in the side. With a cry of pain, she slammed into the wall. She slowly stood up, hand on her side as she sent a powerful blast of ecto-energy at the weapon. She couldn't show off her time powers-

Two gun-like weapons slid out of the walls and fired at her with electricity. The girl screamed and, unknowingly, sent off waves of energy that destroyed the electric guns. But then, there was a minigun.

Her eyes glowing a full red, she threw her hands forward and a blue dome encased the minigun in front of her. Bullets it had fired stopped in the air. No agent could get it to respond. They said things, she could see their mouths moving. She couldn't hear it, but she knew they were surprised.

She didn't even know she could _do_ that kind of thing. She looked at her arms, seeing small, bright green cracks all over her skin. What was going on?

Taken out of her thoughts by goop being fired at her, the blue dome fell. The minigun started sparking and smoking before promptly exploding, sending shrapnel everywhere in the room.

Her powers finally calming down, she felt _exhausted_. She heard footsteps, but she didn't see anyone enter the room as she passed out.

* * *

In and out of consciousness for about a week, Rylie had no idea of what was truly going on.

As she started to finally wake up, she heard… Voices.

"That thing is a freak of nature. Powers that can control time _shouldn't_ be possible. We need to end it as soon as possible!"

"Agent S, calm down," the second voice said- clearly female. "We need to study it first. You're right, powers that control time shouldn't be in the hands of ghosts. But what if _we_ could harness those powers?"

"I… I mean, what would we even _do_ with that?" Agent S asked softly.

"Simple. Eradicate all the ghosts."

Rylie groaned. "N… No…" She mumbled, tired. "Pl- Please. Th- The timeline-"

"Shut up," Agent S said with a growl. "If we have to have something controlling time, it shouldn't be a _ghost_. Your kind is naturally _evil_."

She whimpered, shaking. Trying to curl in on herself, she finally noticed that she was being held to the wall by chains. They didn't give her much slack. Next to her, she noticed, was an empty tank.

"Open the tank, S," the female said, smirking.

Rylie shivered, watching the agent open the glass case. The ghost girl was promptly grabbed and unchained, being shoved into the tank and locking it. There was an ominous grate under her feet and she didn't like that one bit.

She could finally get a good look at the room, though. _It was a lab._ A tabled set up for dissection was right in the middle of the room, ready to use on _her_. The girl started banging on the glass- she couldn't hear outside anymore, but there was something _squishy_ under her feet.

Looking down, she saw a clear green liquid coming up through the grate. It was irritating her feet, but it wasn't that bad.

Until it _was_.

Reaching her ankles, she finally felt _pain_. It was _burning away at her skin_. She let out a long wail of pain, trying to get away from the liquid, but there was nowhere to go. Her wail turned into a scream as the burning liquid kept crawling up her body, slowly going faster and faster.

Her powers wouldn't respond as the liquid got closer to her core. She couldn't swim through the liquid, either.

She barely noticed the door opening in the room outside her tank, but she _did_ notice _who_ came through the door.

Tears welled up at the corners of her eyes. Her _dad_ , in his ghost form, was shackled and being forced to watch, for some reason.

She suddenly couldn't keep her eyes open, the liquid close to completely submerging her. She tried to open her mouth to cry for help, only for it to rush through the new gap, burning her insides.

It felt like it was forever before she was taken out. She was sputtering, coughing the liquid weapon out of her body as best as she could. She couldn't move- everything was hard.

"Rylie!" She heard her father call out, but she couldn't respond, couldn't make a sound.

_Clank. Clank. Clank._

She couldn't see what was coming, but the _pain_ she felt when something new hit her was inscrutable. She felt herself getting _smaller_. It was over as soon as it began, and she was put on the table and restrained. She could hear the same thing happen to her father.

Trying to talk only make squeaks and croaks come out. She felt something stab into her eye- her right eye. Suddenly, there was a _squelch_ as they pulled it out, probably for later study.

"Stop it, she's weak enough! You're going to kill her!" Danny called out angrily.

"Shut up, Phantom," was all that was heard as a _burning_ paste was applied to her exposed chest.

More pain was felt as they started to _cut into her_. She could hear her screams and her fathers. Were they doing the same to him?

Then, she felt… Calmness. Not from herself, but an outside force.

She heard Clockwork's voice.

" _Just hold on._ "


	5. Recovery

It had been three months since the disaster in the aborted timeline.

Danny had been "called" to the clocktower by Rylie's core to help her heal. It was explained to him, by Clockwork, that they had such similar cores that he would be able to help her heal.

She hadn't woken up since her surgery. She now had a digital clock face in her chest. Her core made the numbers glow. Most of her body was wrapped in bandages as she healed, her eye was still covered by bandages.

She was unstable, a daily dose of ecto-dejecto saving her.

As she slowly opened her eye, she was assaulted by a bright white light. Her remaining eye snapped shut again.

_She was still there_.

Rylie threw her hand in front of her face, trying to make it glow, only to feel something wet drip on her face.

There was a voice, she didn't recognize it at first. "If you could help keep her still-"

"St- stop," she croaked softly, her voice weak with disuse. She whimpered, feeling someone grab her arm.

"She's melting again, Clockwork," she heard another voice say. She felt cold, her arms back on whatever she was on top of.

Where was she? This wasn't the Guys in White. And Clockwork was here? Where?

"Timelie, focus on our voices," she heard the first voice say, she still didn't recognize the voice. "You're in the clocktower. You're safe."

"Yeah, kiddo," the other voice said. Who was it? "We're just making sure you're okay."

"Stop," she said, a bit stronger. She heard a cracking sound as _something_ broke in the room. She _couldn't see_ so she had no idea what it was.

She felt lighter, though. Things felt slimy. Everything felt _weird_.

"She needs to stop using her powers or she's going to keep melting-"

"I know, Daniel."

"I- I ne- need… G- Go home," Rylie spoke, trying to sit up, but she couldn't. Why couldn't she? What was wrong?

"You _are_ home," 'Daniel' said. "You need to calm down, Timelie, you're melting faster than we can stop it."

She suddenly felt weak. She couldn't feel her legs, anything under her waist. She stopped struggling, opening her eye again.

Everything was blurry, but she saw a blue figure and a white-haired figure in her vision. Her brain finally made the connection and she stopped fighting back.

"H- Home…" She mumbled. "S- Safe…"

With that, she passed out again.


End file.
